Postnatal
by TheMisfitToy
Summary: What if, when Kili was born, Dís couldn't care for him? Will the bond ever be forged? A/U Pre-Hobbit kiddie!verse and implied mental illness.


I don't own the hobbit, mentions mental health. If I've got stuff wrong apologies

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When Fili was born, Dís swore her heart would burst with love. A head of thick golden hair and the most brilliant green eyes she'd ever seen. Kildin had near danced with joy, and even Thorin had smiled when he laid eyes upon his heir.

However, when Kili was born in the thick of war, Dís felt nothing for the tiny babe born almost two moons early. Moments after her son made his entrance into the world, Balin delivered the news that her beloved husband died at the hands of an orc.

The dwarves believe that when a warrior dies in battle, a new life is conceived or born, and thus, any glimmer of maternal bond was shattered between Dís and the babe which Fili would later name Kili.

The months following the birth were some of the hardest Dís had ever had, Kili was fractious and prone to colic and Fili was the only dwarf able to calm him, her five year old dwarfling, who looked so much like his father was the one who changed him, and woke to tend to him in the night. No matter what Dís did, she just couldn't see the _thing_ as she had taken to calling him as anything other than the reason her husband was dead.

She herself was prone to tears and was known for not getting out of bed for days, the other dwarf women said it was just the body adjusting, but she had not felt this way after Fili was born. Thorin had moved in after the first month after Fili had nearly broken his arm trying to bathe his brother.

Fili was so incredibly confused, his mummy was always sad and she didn't play with him or sing to him or do any of the things mummies were supposed to do, and at first he blamed the baby, but when a tiny hand wrapped around his finger, he knew that his brother was something to be treasured and loved, not something to be mean too.

By the time Kili was a year old, Dís could count on one hand the amount of times she'd held him when he was distressed and she hated herself for it. This was her child, she was supposed to love and care for it, it was a product of the love she and Kildin shared, yet she hated it and precious Fili, couldn't understand why.

The baby –she couldn't use the name Fili had given it yet- would look at her with dark eyes that knew far too much and held a sadness that shouldn't be found in a child so young. It reminded her so much of Frerin and she knew if her brother –and her husband- were here with her, they'd be horrifically disappointed. She knew Thorin was.

It would take another two years, before Dís could bond with her youngest child, watching as Fili and Thorin taught it how to walk and talk how to write his letters and numbers.

When Kili started throwing up, Dís just sighed and rubbed her temples, it was always getting sick or injured and Thorin and Fili were more than capable of dealing with it. The dark cloud that hung above her head had left, but there was still a lingering shadow which quenched the affection she should feel for the second dwarfling.

But when Fili came charging into the room she'd set aside for her craft, screaming about dark spots and shaking, her heart stopped.

The pair rushed to Kili's room and Dís couldn't help the shriek that escaped her lips, Thorin was trying to hold the child who was convulsing violently. Her world stopped when she saw the large black marks covering the skin on the hand of Kili, the baby she'd neglected and ignored, she could vaguely hear Thorin screaming at Fili to get Balin and the gruff dwarf barrelling through the doorway, and screaming, such terrible, terrible screaming.

But wait, she knew that voice, it was hers.

She was the one screaming. A small body collided with hers and almost instantly her arms went to surround her oldest in her embrace, feeling the hot tears against the skin of her arm, it felt like years before her son stopped thrashing and Balin was applying poultices and feeding him potions, muttering under his breath.

When the old dwarf left, his face was solemn and Thorin's eyes were misted over with tears after his conversation with Balin.

Kili was suffering from dwarf pox, which wasn't normally serious, but because Kili was born early and his lungs weren't as strong as his brother's had been at that age and the infection had spread to his chest Thorin told her, but the information just floated around her head as Fili lead her to the chair by the side of Kili's bed and sat her down.

He was so pale, and so incredibly tiny. How had she never noticed how tiny he was? Fili was never this small or delicate looking, even as a babe he'd been big and strong, but this wasn't Fili, this was her second born. Her delicate hand reached out and tucked a strand of thick dark hair behind his ear, her hands dark against the chalky whiteness of skin marred with black.

Dís wouldn't be able to tell you how long she sat there, watching the steady rise and fall of the boys chest, or how many days passed, time had ceased to exist apart from when Fili would come and sit upon the bed and tell her all about something funny Kili had done, or how good he was at aiming even though he was only little.

Listening to Fili's stories, Dís' hate was replaced with unimaginable self-loathing, this was her child and she'd neglected him and now, she knew nothing about him or the dwarf he was growing into.

It took almost two weeks before the toddler stirred, and Dís was the only one in the room with him, Thorin was at work and Fili was with Balin practicing his writing. She was dozing in a chair when a tiny little cough roused her, eyes shooting open, she gazed into the sickness hazed eyes and the rush of love she should've felt when she held him in her arms for the first time after he was born hit her with such force she was momentarily stunned. This was her baby, he was a product of love and his father would live on in him.

"I'm sorry baby, I'm so sorry" Dís sobbed, sweeping her son into the first loving embrace he'd ever experienced from the woman who bore him.

"Fiwi said it was cause yous is sad, I is sorries for being bad and making you sad" the barely awake dwarfling comforted, tiny arms wrapping around his mother.

Tears spilled from Dís' eyes as she listened to her son apologise, Fili's stories about what a lovely child he was were true.

"It's not your fault baby, never your fault" Dís replied, burying her face into the mass of unruly curls atop her sons head.

When Fili came home an hour later and checked on his brother he smiled. His mummy was sat in the big rocking chair with Kili wrapped in a big blanket on her lap, singing to him. Flying into the room he shared with his brother, Fili's grin was big enough to nearly split his face as he bodily threw himself at his mother and baby brother.

"I love you mummy, I love you Kili" the golden dwarfling muttered as Kili crowed with delight and immediately launched at his brother, encasing him in tiny arms like a vine.

"I love you too Fili, and you Kili, mummy love both of you, so very much" Dís swore, pulling her children onto her lap whilst her first true smile in three years graced her face.

These were her children, her sun and her moon, and she would never let them go.

Not for all the gold in Erebor.


End file.
